And with smug face, and eye severe, V. He had on an upper Benjamin VI. He called the ghost out of the corse ;— VII. The Devil knew not his name and lot; Peter knew not that he was Bell: Each had an upper stream of thought, Which made all seem as it was not; Fitting itself to all things well. VIII. Peter thought he had parents dear, He perhaps had found them there IX. Solemn phiz in his own village; Where he thought oft when a boy He'd clomb the orchard walls to pillage The produce of his neighbour's tillage, With marvellous pride and joy. X. And the Devil thought he had, The world is full of strange delusion— XI. That he had a mansion planned In a square like Grosvenor-square, XII. And all this, though quite ideal,— XIII. After a little conversation, The Devil told Peter, if he chose, He'd bring him to the world of fashion By giving him a situation In his own service-and new clothes. XIV. And Peter bowed, quite pleased and proud, And after waiting some few days For a new livery-dirty yellow Turned up with black-the wretched fellow Was bowled to Hell in the Devil's chaise. PART THE THIRD. HELL. I. HELL is a city much like London— II. There is a Castles,' and a Canning, III. There is a * * *,2 who has lost His wits, or sold them, none knows which; He walks about a double ghost, The hatred with which the Government spy Castles was regarded finds a grim reflexion in Lamb's powerful little poem The Three Graves, of which the opening and close are as follows: : Close by the ever-burning brimstone beds Where Bedloe, Oates and Judas hide their heads, Digging three graves. I asked the fiend for whom these rites were meant? "These graves," quoth he, "when life's brief oil is spent, When the dark night comes, and they're sinking bedwards, -I mean for Castles, Oliver, and Edwards."-ED. 2 Probably the blank should be filled by the name of Eldon.-ED. And though as thin as Fraud almost. IV. There is a Chancery Court; a King; An army; and a public debt. V. Which last is a scheme of paper money, 66 Bees, keep your wax-give us the honey, And we will plant, while skies are sunny, Flowers, which in winter serve instead." VI. There is great talk of revolution— Gin-suicide-and methodism : VII. Taxes too, on wine and bread, And meat, and beer, and tea, and cheese, From which those patriots pure are fed, Who gorge before they reel to bed The tenfold essence of all these. VIII There are mincing women, mewing, (Like cats, who amant miserè,1) 1 One of the attributes in Linnæus's description of the Cat. To a similar cause the caterwauling of more than one species of this genus is to be referred ;-except, indeed, that the poor quadruped is compelled to quarrel with its own pleasures, whilst the biped is supposed only to quarrel with those of others. Of their own virtue, and pursuing IX. 1 Lawyers-judges-old hobnobbers X. Things whose trade is, over ladies To lean, and flirt, and stare, and simper, Till all that is divine in woman Grows cruel, courteous, smooth, inhuman, Crucified 'twixt a smile and whimper. XI. Thrusting, toiling, wailing, moiling, XII. And all these meet at levees ;- Breakfasts professional and critical; 1 What would this husk and excuse for a virtue be without its kernel prostitution, or the kernel prostitution without this husk of a virtue? I wonder the women of the town do not form an association, like the Society for the Suppression of Vice, for the support of what may be called the " King, Church, and Constitution" of their order. But this subject is almost too horrible for a joke. |